Fall of the Prophets
by Uiniu
Summary: The doom of the Covenant, imbodied in a from you never would have imagined. I uploaded this story before, but due to some problems I've had to re-write it.
1. Innocence lost

Disclaimer: I do not own, nor did I create the game/science fiction book series, Halo. However, many characters and objects in the story may be from or derived from Halo, which was created by Bungie Studios. All characters in this story are fictitious, and all familiar names not related to the Halo series are purely coincidental. Though this story is based on Halo, it by no means shares the exact characters, story, or technology. I have taken many opportunities to add in characters, create new weaponry, and have added in a completely new scenario. (I know how you all love useless, redundant disclaimers.)  
  
"We must never forget our past, no matter how it haunts us, for our past  
shapes our future"  
  
Prologue: Innocence lost:  
1415 hours, February 3, 2525 (Military Standard Time)/Orbital defense  
system above Human colony Harvest.  
  
"No objects monitored by scan. Area clear, perimeter secure." toned in the dull voice of the computer.  
Ensign Rick Hallows moaned. "Of course there's nothing there," he yelled back at the computer, "there's never anything out there. Damn it!" He slammed his fists on his sensor consol. He hated this post.  
Hallows had dreaded this assignment from the day it was assigned, and rightly so. He was on watch of Harvest's perimeter, a punishment for insubordination. On his duty ship he was removed and nearly discharged from the United Nations Space Command-- the UNSC--for overly aggressive behavior and insubordination. All he had was his status in the Navy, though even that was not much, so he was transferred rather than discharged. Of course he received the quietest station so he could not cause further disruptions.  
  
Having nothing left to care about in his career he often left his station early, after al, Harvest, for its large size, had no problems with rebels or raiders. In his mind nothing could be lost if he left a few minutes early.  
Casting his eyes about he insured no one was watching him as he got out of his chair, hid attitude calmed, "Nothing's gonna happen before my shift ends, won't even be fifty minutes now 'til it's over." He got up and walked out of the room, leaving the controls active as he turned the lights out.  
Five minutes passed and his assumption seemed correct, as it always did. Then with no one left to hear the sound, the consol began to sound its monotonous alarm.  
"Unidentified object approaching at sixty by forty by twenty degrees, recommend notification of defensive system," it toned in calmly, no one to hear its warning.  
Within a minute the alarm blared again, this time the voice sounded serious, "warning: unidentified object accelerating, approaching protected area. Notify and activate defense platforms immediately." A moment passed, and the alarm blared louder, filling the isolated room. "Immediate action necessary, energy discharge detected, object nearing." The consol was not connected to anything other than sensors; only a Human could take action, now the only Human at watch had left.  
  
"Sir," ensign Fellington called to his superior, "I've lost contact with the orbital platform, the last thing received by the local sensors was an energy surge. Its arrays may have over-heated. Readying last video feed from station. "  
The Harvest Ground Defense, or the HGD, was in panic. They had just lost contact with the orbital array last line of orbital defense of the colony. Since no ships with defensive capabilities remained in the area, Harvest was nearly defenseless. Only the HGD stood to defend the planet.  
A hush filled the dim grey room as the wide screen on the front wall lit up, showing the last feed from the defense platform.  
The screen showed simple black with occasional interruptions of white, and Solitary the brown moon of Harvest, and also only satellite in the planetary system. A point of light winked into existence near the moon, then the space around it began to twist, then the distorted space went purple. Odd lights filled the screen, and then the space began to reform, bringing a purple object into the system.  
Ensign Fellington gasped. "It looks like a slipspace transition, but... that's not possible. Nothing could perform such an accurate jump out of sub- space."  
Admiral Allen turned to Fellington, "none of our ships, ensign. What we're looking at is may be of superior technology, if not a simple error in the sensor relays. Let's hope the latter holds true."  
As the object came closer its shape became clear; it was a long, sleek, roughly round purple object, with glowing blue lines flaring at either side. It began to turn towards the camera's view, and then the lines across its sides grew in intensity, slowly turning white. It became certain the object was indeed a vessel of greater technology, as a massive pulsing ball of white flame streaked toward the camera. The screen went black shortly after, as the ball grew close.  
"Damn, if that thing's hostile," the admiral whispered to himself, "then without the platform, we're the only ones who can save this planet." He spoke again, this time to the group around him, "all right people, we've got a hostile in the system, and we're all that's left to save three million lives. Get to your stations; we're going to blow that thing out of the sky if we have to empty our arsenal to do it."  
  
Uiniu glared sadly at his consol. He had been called to man the plasma turrets, a safe position, but also a position to end countless lives. He had never wanted such a thing; as a Grunt he did not share the other Covenant ranks' lust for pain.  
Grunts were the smallest of the Covenant military races, standing just more than a meter and a half and they were considered to be the least intelligent of the races. Therefore the Grunts were always deemed utterly inferior, expendable. The Grunts came from a frozen world with an atmosphere mainly of methane gas. Since the Covenant still did need the Grunt's to live to server the Covenant, all Grunts were equipped with a suit and breather to give them a comfortable and livable atmosphere.  
He, as the rest of his species and many others, was conquered and brought into the Covenant, a collection of alien races, all captured and controlled by the Prophets, an intellectual race preoccupied with power and the technology of the "Forerunners", an long dead alien race which once spanned across the galaxy. The Prophets saw them selves as the instruments of the Gods, infallible and near immortal. They saw them selves as deities, but to Uiniu the Prophets seemed to be arrogant, tyrannical, hypocritical, and even genocidal.  
The prophets had ordered the destruction of this race-- these 'Humans' -- simply for colonizing-- 'stealing' in the Prophet's eyes --planets with Forerunner technology. For simply wanting a place to live, simple ignorance of these Forerunners somehow gave the Prophets adequate reason to wish for the extinction for the Humans, even though the prophets had been stealing Forerunner technology for decades.  
"Target destroyed," Uiniu stated, struggling to cover the remorse in his voice, "Excellency. I request my next target." He choked on the words, his voice quivering.  
The tall creature behind him turned and stared at him. It was an Elite. Elites were powerful, intelligent reptilian creatures, standing nearly a meter taller than a grunt. Their scaly skin was often protected by a thick armor with a full body energy shield projector.  
Though their appearance was often fearsome they held high rank in the Covenant by their intelligence and the favor of the Prophets. The prophets held them in high regard, as the Elites had freely conformed to the Prophets religion and saw them as a holy race, exactly what the Prophets wanted from every race. In turn the Elites became the main muscle behind the Covenant.  
The Elite called to him, "The ground forces will be moving in soon, I want you to join them in the assault. Head to the Gravity lift immediately, I want you on the ground in the first drop zone. "  
Uiniu dreaded working on the ground--he couldn't stand the Hell of a battle field--but he wouldn't dare questioning the order, the Elite was the Ship Master, and could have Uiniu killed on a whim.  
  
Uiniu glanced around the deep slivery-purple room, glancing about, looking for any Grunts he recognized. He wandered headlong into a group of Grunts as his eyes fixed onto a form he recognized.  
Harah's eyes locked with his and sadness covered her face once she recognized his face. She knew how much he hated to fight, and it was obvious he was here to be sent down to the planet. She stood silently as she looked at him with a forlorn expression.  
Elite began ordering the Grunts to move to the pad as she began recalling her days in training with him. She and the others hastily walked onto the pad and braced themselves for the unsettling feeling of the gravity lift.  
The floor beneath then opened up and a large purple beam enveloped them. The purple beam of the gravity lift altered the forces of gravity, allowing a group of soldiers to be moved to and from the ground safely from great vertical distances.  
Uiniu closed his eyes as he felt his body slowly descend towards the planet. He always hated the gravity lift, it was the purple demon that ripped him from the safety of the ship and dropped him into the chaos of his ground training. Now the demon was taking him into something much more dangerous, dropping him onto a battlefield on a doomed planet.  
The second his feet felt solid matter he opened his eyes and quickly shuffled tough the crowd, desperately hurrying to leave the area of the lift. He looked back as the last group of troops ambled into the beam. He silently watched as the half dozen Elites gently glided down to the ground.  
Suddenly the beam and the passengers seemed to stutter, then the graceful purple faded away, leaving the Elites to fight the forces of gravity themselves. They stood no chance. They plunged to the ground, screaming horribly. Tears formed in Uiniu's eyes as he looked down, horror filled him as he witnessed his greatest fear. He had never liked the Elites- - in fact he had always hated them—but this was too horrible to wish upon anyone.  
The sound of the impact filled Uiniu's ears, and he choked on his own breath as he tried to let out a sob. He turned away and opened his eyes.  
Despite the horrible feelings Uiniu was now filled with, not one of the other Covenant soldiers seemed to express any kind of reaction to the accident. The thought passed his mind that he was the only Covenant soldier with any emotions left aside from hate. The thought soon passed as the group was ordered to move. He was left uncomforted as he walked to the group's camp site.  
  
"Let's go Marines, get your asses in gear. We've got green-blooded sons- of-bitches from space raining from the skies. Don't forget to give 'em a nice, warm welcome." Sergeant Franklin prepared his troops abnormally calmly, as if the six alien cruisers in orbit were just another training exercise.  
The massive purple "eggs" add been hovering over the planet for an hour, it seemed that whatever they intended to do they were going to take their time with it. Thinking the ships would land on the surface soon the Marines had set up make-shift mine fields beneath them.  
The mines had to be destroyed by remote, they couldn't just sit back and wait for the ships to be obliterated, they had to be out on the field to give the go by sight. They hoped it wouldn't have to come to close combat, but incase it was to be they brought in a legion of Harvest finest Marines, ten Matrix multi-missile turrets, and six Scorpion heavy tanks to provide a fine fireworks display to greet their guests.  
  
It was Hell on the battlefield. It had been an hour since the drop, then half the squad suddenly burst into flames-- some Human trap, no doubt-- and now half a dozen green beasts and countless Humans began pouring over the hill, sending a hail of explosives towards them. The once calm and green plain was now littered with fire and scorched earth.  
Uiniu had always been told that the humans were primitive, that their weapons were mere projectiles, no match for the plasma weapons from the Forerunners. No one ever told him anything about their explosives. From explosive shells tearing holes though the Covenant advance their numbers had fallen from eight thousand strong to little more than three thousand.  
Plasma and projectiles streaked across the plain, burning into Uiniu's eyes and ringing in his ears. The number of humans on the battle field had finally started to dwindle, but not without taking many Covenant down with them.  
Uiniu was frozen stiff, he watched silently as he saw Elites over take the last of the Human tanks, then as a single grenade landed amongst them and sent them flying. Without the tanks the Humans were finally outgunned, but that didn't stop them from fighting so forcefully. He had never seen such a tremendous act of courage. The Covenant fought for fear and obedience, but for these Humans, it seemed a will to live was all they needed to keep fighting, even when totally outmatched. A tear formed in Uiniu's eye as he wondered what the Covenant could possibly hope to achieve from slaughtering them. In one battle they had shown more noble a sprit than any of the Covenant had ever in all Uiniu's life.  
He had to get away; he couldn't stand to watch any more death.  
  
Parupar found the cave, so he got to hide in the deepest spot. Uiniu looked around the small, brown opening in the ground; tiny stalactites loomed overhead, tiny white crystals littered the floor and sprouted from the walls. The cave wasn't all that deep, but it would hold the six grunts adequately. Parupar, Uiniu, Harah, Lurul, Juluj, and Larhlar had all ran from the battle and decided to hide until it was over. IT would have been so easy too, if an Elite hadn't spotted them.  
"Is she gone yet," Lurul whispered, "I'm tired of sitting around, waiting." Her voice rose, "Let's take her down!" She cringed, startled, forgetting the tone of her voice.  
She poked her head out the opening to check for the Elite. Uiniu slowly followed, just close enough to feel the heat as a flash of blue plasma struck her face. Hate rushed over Uiniu as he saw her fall. He ripped a plasma grenade off his belt as he hopped from his cover. His eyes narrowed as he spotted a red armored Elite in front of him, plasma rifle still faintly glowing blue. His teeth clenched as he tossed the grenade at the Elite, quickly drawing his plasma pistol as the Elite raised his weapon. Time seemed to flow slowly then, the three second fuse on the grenade seemed to linger forever, just long enough to allow Uiniu to lob a burning blast of plasma at the Elite, just long enough to allow the Elite to return the favor.  
A burst of super-hot matter and the red beast disappeared. Uiniu turned, he noticed the battlefield seemed unnaturally calm.  
He was struck silent by the sight. Thousands of bodies lay before him, not one moving. Flaming husks of tanks, plasma scored bodies and decimated Covenant ranks. The once green, peaceful plain was scorched, filled with fire and bodies.  
Is this the price of their war, Uiniu pondered, just because of some Damn artifacts, this was justified? Just for artifacts they justify genocide?  
Uiniu screamed a soul shattering scream, tears flooded his vision. The others walked up to him, eyes wide with fear. He turned to face them, and they fell deathly silent. They walked back over to the gravity life.  
The battle was over, and Uiniu felt worse than he ever had, even without killing a single Human he felt as if he had just witnessed the death their entire species.  
  
They stood in the cargo bay for an hour before Uiniu was called to the control room. He slowly walked back, letting sadness slowly give way to hate. By the time he walked into the immense, faintly lit Control Room he was ready to lunge for the Ship Master.  
Uiniu managed to hold control as the Elite turned to him, "it is the decree of the Prophets that this world is to be destroyed. You are the gunner aboard this vessel, so you must fulfill this order. Man your station."  
The Prophets, Uiniu realized, it was them all along. Those... bastards! Uiniu's eye's and mind welled with rage.  
He turned away and walked to his post. It wasn't the Elites fault for this slaughter, it was the Prophets. He couldn't do anything to them now, he would have to wait if he was to bring them justice. He only hoped he had a chance to fight back against them before the Humans had fallen. He suspected he would need their help as well.  
Uiniu activated the firing sequence and did his best to stay stoic.  
White, burning balls of plasma arched from the turrets on the ship, streaking towards the planet. The balls struck and vaporized the ground beneath them, and then the ground slowly condensed. After hundreds of plasma balls hit the planet the whole surface, every last plant, and every animal boiled away and reformed slowly, forming a single glowing sheet of molten glass across the planet. Uiniu watched the horrid sight, knowing no living creature could have survived.  
Harvest was dead.  
  
Uiniu's eyes were ablaze as he walked into the cargo bay. Standing in a circle were Parupar, Harah, Larlar, Juluj, and one Grunt Uiniu didn't recognize. They turned to Uiniu.  
Uiniu's hate bubbled over, "they'll pay. I'll bring them justice if I have to kill them all myself." They knew who he was referring to. 


	2. Chosen

Author's note: Unfortunatly, due top computer problems, I haven't time to revise this chapter,. and since it was created well before the prolouge, I'm afraid they may not compare all that well. I'll get to revising soon as possible, but for now my main goal is to get thisstory back on line.

Chapter 1: Chosen: 2026 hours, December 15, 2552 (Human Time units)/Human Outpost on Raltor 8,  
Raltor Centari system, Five kilometers west of outpost  
  
Uiniu activated the communications device in his breathing apparatus, and the Grunt called "Check your weapons!" into it, calling to the seven thousand Grunts under his command.  
The Grunts were arranged in a hundred rows of seventy, followed by the squadron of eight foot tall Elites that were supposed to control the Grunts, who had given Uiniu that responsibility for lack of interest in the squabbling little creatures. That proved to be their worst mistake.  
And the last one they ever made.  
"Troops, charge your weapons!" Uiniu called to his brigade, the cue for them to over-charge their plasma pistols.  
Seven thousand super-heated balls of bright green-white light formed among the ranks of the diminutive creatures, each light a plasma pistol in over-charge. The Elites, alarmed, turned toward the Grunts and Lera 'Lilamee, a black armored Elite, yelled an order in a deep bellow, but was over-powered by Uiniu's next command as it roared over the local frequency:  
"About-face!" Uiniu roared, as loud as his high-pitched voice could yell. "Everyone with a clear shot, fire! Blast them to Hell!"  
With that, one hundred half-meter blots of super-heated plasma streaked toward the Elites, splashing over their shields and boiling away flesh and bone.  
Looking at the aftermath, the burning hunks of flesh, carbonized bone and rapidly boiling purple-black blood, there was a loud cheer as thousands of Grunts screamed in victory. Uiniu called for silence and the order was followed by several thousand voices falling silent.  
"Charge your weapons!" the miniscule creature called, and all Grunts with uncharged weapons quickly over-charged their weaponry. Seven thousand tiny suns flared, waiting to unleash their plasma-hell. "That is our target."  
  
Onboard the Eternal Gospel, the Covenant Cruiser hovering just half a kilometer above the scene of the rebellion, Shipmaster Paru 'Pulamee was standing in a thirty meter tall room, the Control Room of the ship, looking at a display of the cruiser's inventory when an alarm blared. What Humans called a Jackal, which was a short vaguely birdlike reptilian creature, squawked a message to the Shipmaster: the Grunts on the surface had rebelled. 'Pulamee ordered the destruction of the Grunts. The order came just too late for the ship's plasma arrays to charge and fire.  
  
Uiniu pointed up at the Eternal Gospel, and his troops all nodded in unison. They were about to do something most Grunts would never imagine of doing. They were about to form an effective assault on their enslavers, the Covenant. They were a bout to boil away one of the Covenant's greatest vessels, and a crew of Twenty thousand, minus the Grunts themselves and the group of Elites they have already vaporized.  
"Take aim, Fire! Fire! Boil them alive!" screeched Uiniu as the cruiser's plasma turrets began to charge. The sky was then ablaze with seven thousand green-white suns burning toward the Eternal Gospel. In a second they smashed up against the cruisers shields, causing them to shine silver, then immediately boil away to nothing. They now had a straight shot for the ship.  
"Charge and fire at will! Open fire!" yelped Uiniu, unable to contain the excitement in his voice.  
Once again and twice more seven thousand suns flared into existence and flew to the unshielded ship. After the brigade's weapons dumped the access heat produced by the over-charged shots they recharged the pistols and fired relentlessly. The second salvo boiled the lower-aft armor of the ship, leaving the crew quarters, engineering and control room vulnerable to the small aliens' plasma fire. The third and fourth salvos, accompanied by many a Grunts swearing, served to vaporize these sections of the ship, leaving the ship to drop gracelessly to the ground, less than a kilometer away from the legion's position.  
  
'Pulamee bellowed indecipherably as the last salvo impacted just under his hooves, boiling him alive. 'Pulamee's aides shrieked for only an instant as their blood, flesh and bones flash-vaporized. Every crewmember on board was panicking, if not for the certainty of their deaths, then because a pitiful group of Grunts would be killing them all.  
  
"Burn! Burn! You deserve no less!" Uiniu yelled as the craft shuddered and collapsed on impact.  
"How did you know small-arms fire could destroy a cruiser?" inquired Kikil, a nearby Grunt.  
"I didn't," Uiniu excitedly yelped, his voice cracking "But these babies can boil away half a meter of most common rocks, so why couldn't several thousand boil a ship."  
"But the distance was..."  
"Shut up, we need to find ourselves a ship to get us off this rock!"  
  
"We're stealing a warship?" Janujan, a near by Grunt yelled after hearing Uiniu's plan.  
"All but a skeleton crew have left that ship, we use the gravity lift to enter the vessel and fry anyone and anything that makes itself an obstacle," replied Uiniu.  
"How many officers left on the ship?" a high-pitched voice from the crowd inquired over the local channel.  
"Ship manifest shows only ten Elites and twenty Jackals left aboard." Uiniu replied after consulting with the ship, which was still oblivious of the treasonous act that had just occurred. "The ship is currently under command by Ruk, a high-ranking Jackal, while the Elites are taking a break from duty. They'll be off duty for another three hours. Let's move!"  
The Grunts ran as fast as their stubby legs could take them, quickly tiring the miniscule creatures. Upon reaching the war vessel they ran for the grav-lift. The ship's grav-lift was still powered up and was set to bring any troops under it slowly into the belly of the ship. Uiniu gave an order for the Grunts to head for the gravity lift.  
The tiny soldiers one by one walked under it and were plucked up by the purple light around them. As the first group of Grunts hovered up to the cargo bay doors they were apprehensive, wondering if the door would open in time. It often always a worry to Covenant soldiers, a closed bay door could mean being crushed to death on the door.  
As the last of his brigade floated in to the cargo bay Uiniu finally hobbled under the gravity beam and let himself be carried into the ship. He was disturbed by the thought of his organs leaping up at his throat. Also present in his mind was the awful feeling of two forces tearing at his body, if one stopped he would drop straight down or up and smashing his frail body, and that if the forces were equal he may be torn in two.  
He checked the ranks of his allies and found everyone intact. He began to order them to fight their way to the Control Room, but then realized that they would not know the path-each Covenant cruiser was unique in design. He the ordered them to follow him, although he himself did not know the way.  
He lead them while wandering randomly down the ten-meter tall violet- lavender halls, organizing them in a long ten row line, ignoring the obvious tactical flaw of the formation. They killed ten of the ship's decimated complement of Jackals as they went.  
After wandering down one particularly long hallway he unknowingly walked into the quarters of the ship's Elite complement. He then saw the ten remaining Elites onboard in close formation. They were obviously not aware of their visitor, as none of them seemed. He immediately activated a plasma grenade, an adhesive device that bursts in a fury of blue-white super- heated plasma after five seconds, and then waited three seconds. He then threw the device at the nearest Elite. The grenade then exploded on the creatures back on impact, killing all ten Elites in one hellish super- heated sphere.  
"First nine Grunts in here get plasma rifles!" Uiniu yelled at his men, grabbing a plasma rifle for himself.  
There was an uproar of hoots and exited barks as nine Grunts quickly ran into the long, violet-lavender room, and then a series of disappointed howls filled the ship. The nine grunts all immediately grabbed the prize for their labor, and with out saying a word, ran back into the corridor to join the front line of the makeshift army.  
Dark purple corridor after corridor they eventually located the Control Room. The looming seven-meter door was the second to last obstacle to the control of the Unstoppable Specter. Out of the warship's twenty Jackal crew they had slain fifteen, leaving a presumed five Jackals within the Control Room. Yet that wasn't then strongest impediment to them. There was a meter- thick door with major shielding they would have to destroy to reach the Control Room.  
"Front row: Fire!" was heard by all seven thousand Grunts after Uiniu yelped the statement into his local transmitter.  
Fifty Grunts in the front row fired, and were rewarded with only fifty thousand sparks spraying forth from their plasma pistols. Screams and yelps filled the hall as fifty Grunts cried out in surprise. That could mean only one thing: the small weapons' batteries had been depleted. Several loud clacks where heard as every Grunt that participated in the futile attack dropped its claw-like plasma pistol in unison. Uiniu prayed the Jackals had not heard them, but it was certain they had for all the noise, if not for the massive heat signature the sparks undoubtedly created.  
  
"Weapons check!" Uiniu called, as if it were a run of the mill check. There were thousands of dull clicks as every Grunt checked his or her weapon in unison. The charge gage of every plasma pistol flickered from empty to half full, definitely not a good sign. The plasma rifle wielding Grunts found the rifles in only slightly better condition: the charge meter read one seventh full, just below the critical point were the weapon would not be able to fire effectively.  
"Pistol bearers: point your weapon at the ceiling and fire twice." Uiniu ordered, hopping the battery gage was the only problem with the handguns.  
With that, thousands of Grunts fired into the air twice. The first salvo was a catastrophe; half of the weapons fired, half of the shots sizzled inside the weapon from which they were fired and sprayed sparks everywhere. The second salvo was Armageddon: every energy pistol belched thousands of sparks and immediately overheated, multiplying the ambient temperature in the corridor and creating a blinding green-white light. As if the light and heat were not enough payment for the gesture, nearly every Grunt among the ranks dropped its energy weapon with a click and began hooting, yelping, and screaming. They all either covered their heads or fell to the ground for protection from the hellish show of sparks, many screaming: "It burns!"  
  
Grunts natural methane-filled atmosphere was ice-cold, and they therefor required a special environment suit with methane tanks and frozen atmosphere. The suits' temperature systems could not compensate well enough for the flash-heat wave, so every Grunt was in a temporary hell.  
Soon the heat and sparks had passed the Grunts slowly stopped squealing.  
Uiniu, confused, asked the group, "Everybody okay?" He received a loud  
bark from each Grunt, meaning they were confused as hell, but not  
injured.  
"All right, without our pistols, we're going to have to approach this a little differently. First, we blow the door with plasma grenades-" just as he spoke he became aware of the closing blast door behind him, the Jackals, no doubt alerted by the gargantuan heat signature and excessive barking from the Grunts had activated the blast door. The blast doors made by the Covenant had the most powerful shields by proportion known, but plasma grenades had a nasty trick in them aside the adhesive properties: they corrupt and disable any electrical shielding system, at least temporarily.  
"Fine," puffed Uiniu, noticeably irritated with the new delay, "we blow the doors with grenades and then everyone with a plasma rifle will rush in. Once the rifles' batteries have been depleted we will bash in their skulls with them. If anything goes wrong, I want wave after wave of Grunts in here, killing any remaining Jackals. Ready?"  
"Yes, Excellency!" they replied, using the honorific normally given to Elites.  
"Why do I deserve that title? I'm about to lead you into the most ignorantly dangerous mission of your life!" he answered, jokingly.  
  
"Second row: prep and throw grenades on my mark...mark!" with Uiniu's order fifty bright-blue flaming grenades streaked through the dull air of the cruiser and landed in a staggered formation on the purple blast door. Four seconds later the door came alive with brilliant blue light as the plasma explosives burst with a poof! After the gases cleared the door appeared to have vanished, leaving a confused Jackal just beyond the door undefended.  
Uiniu, seeing the opportunity, raised and fired his weapon straight at his foe, boiling away the poor creature's head in a second. With that every plasma rifle wielding Grunt ran in the room and fired, killing three more Jackals, leaving just one Jackal left-the last one on board. The last jackal live was Ruk, the temporary captain of the vessel.  
Uiniu knocked her to the ground and held his rifle against her head. "Don't. Move." he commanded.  
"Uiniu," called a Grunt that was attempting to take control of the vessel, "this ship's got an AI!"  
Bad news. While Human Artificial Intelligences, or AIs, help run ships and perform various tasks, Covenant AIs were created solely to prevent capture of a vessel. If someone or something attempted to commandeer a ship, the AI would do everything it could to prevent capture. Because of worries that AIs may have errors and lock out ship commands without just cause each was given a failsafe code to disable them.  
"What's the failsafe, Ruk? Tell me or I'll kill you where you lay!" Uiniu ordered.  
"I would never tell it to a gas sucker like you!" Ruk angrily squawked.  
"So, if I didn't suck methane you would tell me?"  
"Yeah, if you can take off that mask and not die I will." Ruk joked.  
"Fine." Uiniu simply replied, as unscrewed his breather, an action that could quickly kill him, and stated: "I'm not breathing methane now!"  
Ruk, astonished, blurted out "Computer, activate failsafe code: 'High Charity'." without even thinking.  
Uiniu screwed on the breathing apparatus as Rulirul, a fellow Grunt took control of the ship.  
"What do you call this, gas sucker?" Ruk asked.  
"I call this treason!" hooted Uiniu, "and I call this overkill!" he joyfully added, as he stuck two active plasma grenades to Ruk's neck and coolly walked away.  
"Keep the ship out of danger," Uiniu said just after Ruk was vaporized inside two mini-suns, "I'm going to take a nap."


End file.
